Structure of poems Flashcards
Whoso list to hount
- Petrarchan sonnet
- divided into two parts within that single stanza: an initial eight lines, called the octave, and a final six lines, called the sestet.
- The final six lines complicate that scenario,
- Volta underscores just how desperate the speaker’s quest has become.
- Confused and uncertain meter underscores despair
Sonnet 116
• Shakespearean sonnet.
• final lines reaffirm—to the point of being hyperbolic—how certain the speaker is of his position.
• Iambic pentameter
• regularity of the meter mimics the solidity and dependability of the star itself.
tension between form and content reinforces the speaker’s point. Love does not change when it encounters difficulties or challenges
The Flea
• 3 stanzas with nine lines each
• 3 couplets and a tercet
• First six lines – alternates between iambic tetrameter and pentameter
• Tercet – first line in tetrameter, last two in pentameter
• union appears in the tercet, with its single rhyme: it symbolizes the way speaker and mistress merge together in the flea.
• the mistress’s difference is not cancelled or assuaged, and instead it is simply overwhelmed by the two iambic pentameter lines that close the stanza)
The changing, syncopated rhythm of the poem models both this intimacy and the distance that persists within it.
To His Coy Mistress
- rhyming iambic tetrameter couplets
- Marvell seems to have generated the form specifically for the poem. Indeed, the poem seems to playfully resist the expectations that its early readers would’ve had about proper form.
- In the 17th and 18th centuries, English poets often wrote in a form called “heroic verse:” rhymed iambic pentameter couplets. As its name suggests, this kind of verse was often reserved for heroic subjects: battles, epic journeys, etc. Marvell’s poem falls just short of this heroic meter.
The Garden of Love
- The poem is comprised of three quatrains, creating twelve lines in total. The simplicity of the form allows for the expression of a clear argument, lending a sense of gravity
- poem is told in the past tense, lending a sense of foregone conclusion to the poem’s bleak assessment of organized religion.
- poem’s refusal to settle into a purely anapaestic meter perhaps embodies the fact that it is at heart a poem about conflict—between love and organized religion.
- Last two lines - internal rhyme helps create a newfound sense of metrical rigor
She Walks in Beauty
- Regularity reflects a sense of order, harmony, and symmetry befitting the type of rare beauty the poem attempts to describe.
- the fact that each stanza uses only two different rhyme sounds helps to mirror the poem’s central antithesis between light and dark. Each stanza is a kind of fusion between these two different rhyme sounds, just as the woman’s beauty brings together the “best of dark and bright.”
Remember
Iambic pentameter to give the poem a dignified rhythm appropriate to the seriousness of the subject.
• The refrain ‘Remember me’ appears twice (anaphora)
• The inversion of the first foot in l. 2, 7 and 13 hints at the passion which is fighting for expression.
the strict pentameter lines convey the enclosure and restraint of the speaker as s/he suggests that s/he has more to express but cannot find the appropriate words in which to do so.
La Belle Dame sans Merci
• Ballad
The poem’s content also nods towards the context that produced the form—ballads were first popular in the later medieval period
• First three lines of each stanza are in iambic pentameter. Last line is shortened to two feet of 4-5 syllables, creating a start/stop rhythm
I, Being Born a Woman and Distressed
- Petrarchan sonnet – show off for educated elite. While the poet here is probably not wishing to show off but to make an important point about society’s expectations and women’s constricted roles
- Eight lines propose an ‘argument’, followed by a volta or ‘turn’; and six lines form the ‘reply’. This sonnet splits into two clear binary opposites; that of submissive womanhood and assertive, almost masculine, womanhood.
One Flesh
- sixteen lines of largely free verse, though with irregular rhyme.
- Could reflect the freedom of their love. It changes and flows but doesn’t break.
- Rhyming monosyllables sound crisp and assertive. Poly-syllabic words form feminine rhyme, softer and — in this context — sadder. ‘Feather’ and ‘together’, for example, have a falling pitch and slowing rhythm, reflecting the meaning of the poem.
Meeting Point
• The first and last lines of each stanza are identical - The repetition of the lines emphasises the central idea of the poem – that time is standing still for the couple.
8 quintains
• rhyme scheme is ABABA.
• The structure provides reference points and the repetition creates unity. It also creates a circular narrative, which emphasises the idea of the moment seeming to last forever.
• The lines are iambic tetrameter - regularity of the rhythm works like a ticking clock or a beating heart.
For My Lover, Returning to His Wife
- one stanza of forty-eight lines. The verse is free, unconstrained, with irregular line-lengths and no rhyme scheme.
- This gives the poem a free flow to express the changing, complex emotions.
- using the first person singular ‘I’, forming a dramatic monologue.
- Confessional poem
Wild Oats
- three stanza poem that is divided into octaves
- Each stanza begins with reference to time ‘about 20 years ago’ ‘and in seven years after that’ ‘parting, after about five’. However, the second has no ‘about’ - trying to seem careless
- Subtle rhyme - only when regarding Rose. Sporadic: tangle of relationships
Vergissmeinnicht
- The poem comprises six four-lined quatrains.
- The metrical rhythm is iambic tetrameter
- The scheme is ABBA, AAAA, AABB, ABAB, ABAB, ABAB. The effect is to create irregularity reflecting the mood changes in the varying stages
Timer
- Harrison uses the Meredithian line sonnet form
- There is a complex rhyme scheme — ABAB CDCD EF EF GHGH — that gives the poem subtle coherence.
- the poem begins and ends with the ring, as if encircled by its significance.
